#Musingz4life

Taken for Granted

It’s easy to take people for granted after you’ve known them for a while. The initial excitement of a new friend or lover wears off after a few months. The term “Seven Year Itch” refers to the decline in happiness around the seventh year of marriage, but most people I have talked to these days have never had relationships that even made the five-year mark, let alone a year or two! Divorce rates in Christian marriages continue to skyrocket. If we cannot fathom what perseverance means in a marriage to another human being whom we can see, how can we understand perseverance in a relationship with God whom we cannot see?

Look at how God pursues us:

“I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me;

I was found by those who did not seek me.
To a nation that did not call on my name,
I said, ‘Here am I, here am I.’2 All day long I have held out my hands
to an obstinate people,who walk in ways not good,
pursuing their own imaginations—3 a people who continually provoke me
to my very face…”

~ Isaiah 65:1-3

All day long, God holds out His hands to a people who continually reject Him and choose to pursue their own imagination. I’m not referring to imagination as in terms of delusions, but it’s more like dreaming of your future without including God in your plans. When you plan for the next 30, 40 or 50 years until you die, do you consider how your life could glorify God in ever-increasing measure, or is it all about you? God looks for you even though He never crosses your mind for a millisecond.

11 “But as for you who forsaketheLordand forget my holy mountain,who spread a table for Fortune
and fill bowls of mixed wine for Destiny,12 I will destine you for the sword,
and all of you will fall in the slaughter;
for I called but you did not answer,
I spoke but you did not listen.
You did evil in my sight
and chose what displeases me.”

~ Isaiah 65:11-12

How about those who have already tasted the goodness of God and still choose to forsake Him? Forsaking God is not an overnight process. It varies for everyone, depending on how much one compromises with evil. The more you compromise, the faster and easier it becomes to backslide.

“A farmer went out to sow his seed.4 As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up.5 Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow.6 But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root.7 Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants.8 Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred,sixty or thirty times what was sown.9 Whoever has ears, let them hear.”

~ Matthew 13:3-9

Some who come to the faith last a short time, while others last a very long time and then they fall away. Very few last until they breathe their last, and that’s why the scriptures say that the road to destruction is wide but the gate to heaven is narrow (Matthew 7:13). God reaches out to us every single day. He reaches out to people who don’t know Him yet and extends the same to those who already have a relationship with Him. Walking with God means having a loving relationship with Him, not only “till death do we part” but for eternity after death.

Have we taken God for granted and chosen the wider path, or will we pray and ask God for help to be obedient so we can stay on the road less traveled?

“In fact, this is love for God: to keep his commands. And his commands are not burdensome.”